The dry clean symbol
A circle on the tag means a cleaner has a safe route for this garment. The letters inside it are addressed to them, not to you.
Dry clean: Dry cleaning works for this garment — any normal solvent and process.
Dry clean, P solvents: Dry clean with perchloroethylene or hydrocarbon solvents — the P is an instruction to your cleaner, not to you.
Dry clean, F solvents: Dry clean with petroleum solvent only — a gentler process your cleaner knows by the letter F.
Dry clean, P solvents, gentle: Dry clean in P solvents on a reduced, gentler process — the bar under the circle asks the cleaner to go easy.
What the circle looks like
The base mark is a plain open circle, drawn the same size as the other symbols in the row. Everything else in this family is that circle with something added: a letter inside naming the process, a bar underneath asking for a gentler run, or a line through it ruling the whole thing out.
On a full row of care symbols the circle sits last, after the iron. It is the plainest mark on most tags and the easiest one to skim past — which is a shame, because it is the one the person behind the counter reads first.
A circle is permission, not a restriction
A circle on its own says dry cleaning works for this garment. It does not say dry cleaning is the only thing that works, and it is not the same instruction as “dry clean only.” That harder rule takes two marks: the circle, and a washtub with an X through it. The crossed-out tub is what rules out water; the circle only promises the cleaner a safe route.
So a circle next to an ordinary washtub means both are true — the garment can go to the cleaner, or through your machine on the terms the tub sets. A circle next to a crossed-out tub is the real “dry clean only,” and there the cleaner is the only route left.
P, F, and W are written for your cleaner
A letter inside the circle names the process the garment was tested for. P means perchloroethylene or a hydrocarbon solvent, the standard process at most shops. F means petroleum solvent only — a gentler, less common route. W means professional wet cleaning: a controlled water process run in the cleaner’s equipment, with agitation, temperature, and drying held to settings a home machine simply does not have.
None of the three is an instruction you can act on. There is no home version of P, no consumer F, and the W is not a permission slip for your washer. Your entire job with a lettered circle is to leave the tag in the garment so the counter can read it.
The bar under the circle
A bar beneath the circle asks for a reduced process: less mechanical action, lower drying heat, a shorter cycle. It is the dry-cleaning equivalent of the gentle cycle, and it turns up on beaded pieces, loose weaves, and anything trimmed with a part that could work itself loose in a full run.
Like the letters, the bar is the cleaner’s business rather than yours — but it is worth pointing at across the counter on a busy morning. Say “this one has the gentle bar,” and the ticket gets written differently.
Questions people actually ask
Does a circle mean I can’t machine wash the garment?
Not by itself. The circle speaks for professional cleaning and the washtub speaks for water — they are separate instructions. Look for a crossed-out tub on the same tag before you rule washing out.
What if my cleaner doesn’t offer F solvent?
Show them the tag and ask. Petroleum solvent is less common than P, and a shop that can’t run F will usually say so rather than substitute. Their answer for your garment beats any guess made in advance.
Related
Reading a whole tag, not one symbol? Tap everything you see into the decoder — it gives the careful combined plan.